Blockage

"it was a dark and stormy night..."

"The night was humid..."

"The night was dry yet raining..."

"The clouds were dark...."

"The storm...."

Excuse me for the absence and lack of posting. Writing a short story is harder than i thought and i have less than one week to do it. I recently saw Throw Momma From The Trainfor the 50th time and am now understanding the writers frustration.

I think i have been on "the wind howled" for two weeks now. I don't have any characters, any setting but simply "the wind howled...". I think if i heard a wind howl right now i would throw my computer and this stupid short story out the window.

Thanks wind and your dumb howling.

Happenings.

I got an A in 2 classes

I got a B in two others

I got robbed of a B in the last one (that bastard. Surprisingly it is not Mr. Douchebag or Lovely Environmental lit professor).

My head hurts because my brother gave me a cold. He's still as a douche as usual and i spend my days avoiding him so that i won't stab him.

Marie has gained 70 pounds and has dragged me to several movies just so she can talk about her weight in between character dialogue

My mom and I went crazy Christmas shopping and now we are both broke. But we make up for the lack of money with late night coffee talks and digging through our closets to examine old clothes.

Mom has also agreed that going to Scotland will make a nice graduation present ( i saw the travel books in her car the other day).

The grey cat is peaceful and content. Sleeping all day and chilling all night. But the other cat is dealing some behavioral problems ( pooping and peeing where she shouldn't be) and likes sleeping on the toilet.

I have a short story due in less than 4 weeks that i am having problems with. Plot, character, endings and beginnings are overwhelming me and i have that to thank for some sleepless nights and drowsy mornings.

My body aches from this flu like thing that i have. I'll be back in business once i can breathe out of my nose again and the coughing subsides.

~Beckett

The Short End Of It. Part 2

The idea of writing my graduate school short story is daunting.



Seriously.



For the past couple of days i have unsuccessfully put myself under a writing schedule. Wake up. Write. Nap. Write. Dance with cats. Write. Nap. Write. Eat. Write. Sleep



I have not exactly stuck to this plan though. Not with all the christmas stuff and tv watching.



It's not that i don't have ideas. Because i do. I'm full of stories that i want to tell and write. Sometimes i get confused about the technical side of things ( 1st person, 3rd person, settings, and narrative voice) but i know the first moment i put my hands onto the keys something will come out. Something.



However i have been unable to open up Microsoft Word and type anything. My fingers seem petrified to do so.



I admit i am hella nervous about writing this story. Every time i go to put something down on paper i think "this could be the sentence that gets me in to a writing program or not". And i guess the knowledge of that is making this process a hard one.



I've going to have to put my nerves somewhere though, chanel it so it doesn't stunt me like it has.

Enviromental Lit

I can not explain how much this class has changed my life. I enjoyed going every Tuesday and Thursday and my teacher (author, professor, and nature writer extraordinaire) was exceptional. I think it is the first time i have ever been sad as i turned in an exam. Not the kind of "shit i failed this test/class" sad. But a "I'm not going to ever sit in this class and listen to him speak about nature as if it is divine" sort of sad.

The exam wasn't that hard just long and thorough. I was one of the last to leave and probably the saddest as i handed in my paper. I feel like i have him to blame and thank for wanting to climb mountains and see the world, not just see it, but be a participant of it.

One exam down, two more to go, and portfolio to turn in.

I'm so tired but so close to the end.

Playing Favorites?

Two weeks ago...Well really...at the beginning of the year, Mr. McDouchebag said that we would have to give presentations at the end of the semester. Basically we would have to read a book by a creative nonfiction writer, print out some handouts and give a short presentation in front of the class.

Of course i was not feeling this. There was a time when giving speeches wasn't a big deal. I'd get nervous of course, but my voice and legs would not shake, and my determination got me through it.However because of a) anxiety and b) never having to do a presentations at my school, i just am not use to public speaking anymore. Yesterday i had to read two poems in front of my creative writing class, and my legs were so wobbly i thought i would fall over.

For the last two weeks though i knew we had to give our presentations for Mr. McDouchebags class, but i didn't read any books by a creative nonfiction writer and was wavering on whether i would fully commit to this 5-10 minute speech.

Thanks to the lovely people at the GRE i actually had excuses for the two days of class i missed. Monday i was in the library going over words like nebula, and on Wednesday i knew that after a four hour exam i wasn't going to go to class. I emailed him on Monday to tell him that I would be absent in his class. I was hoping that by today we would just wrap things up, turn in portfolio's and do evaluations.

I spent the whole night revising the essays i wrote for the class. I actually even took his suggestions to heart trying to use the comments i thought counted and discard the ones based on his personal style as writer.

Once i actually went over his comments, he had some (and by some i mean few) good suggestions. I stayed up until 4 am in the morning retooling my anxiety paper, and i think it came out ten times better than the original.

Of course with 3 hours of sleep I dragged around the whole day. But i had my portfolio semi done and was hoping he wouldn't bring up the fact that i hadn't presented yet.

When i got to class, some girl who obviously was nervous about talking in front of the class, was asking how many people still had to present. When i sat down she shot me a look:

"You didn't go yet did you?"

"No i thought we were just turning in portfolio's"

"No portfolios aren't due till next week"

Motherfucker. At this point i'm thinking what the hell am i going to say when he walks in expecting me to present on an author. The nervous girl was trying to tell me i could quickly run to the computer lab, find some author, run back to the room and then present. But she didn't know about my three hours of sleep, and i shrugged my shoulders saying "i'll just tell him i'm not doing it"

She just looked at me as if she just learned the Easter Bunny wasn't real.

"what do you mean, you're not going to do it"

"I'll just say i don't have anything to present"

Of course in my mind i was thinking "HOLY MOTHER OF...", and silently hoping he wouldn't be totally pissed. When he walked in i assumed avoiding eye contact would help out. But it didn't, when i looked up he was staring at me, he reminisced about the semester(I feel like i was taking a different class from everyone else. I did not have as much fun as everyone was making it out to be). Then he started talking about presentations.

"So i think we have 3 more people going, and then we can end class early" The three people scheduled to go, did not include me. He called the names of the last few people who had to present, and then took a seat right next to me as the three kids did there presentations.

I looked around the room as people kept giving me the "i don't think she went" stare. I was holding my breath hoping that no one would say anything. When the last person went, Mr. McDouchebag got up from his seat, went to the front of the class and called it wrapped.

????

There was no talk of me going. There was no general "piss-ness"(new word for the GRE) on his face, and he seemed actually pretty happy. And i was happy cause i had dodge an awkward moment.

He had to leave as we did evaluations, and when he did the few students left suddenly turned on me.

"You got an easy pass" the girl who didn't want to give a speech said "he was sitting right next to you, and he didn't say a word."

" I don't know what to say, i just got really lucky"

"That's not right Everyone else had to go" The Writer said as i walked out of the room.

I have no idea what to think about this. The man does not like me, or at least not my work. The whole semester i've been getting my papers back, marked up with x's and whole paragraphs crossed out. After the meeting i had with him about the short story he's totally been sort of rude to me.

And yet. He gave me a pass. He didn't say one word. I don't know how to take this. It was either incredibly nice of him or shitty.

Either way. I didn't have to make a speech (it wasn't a graded assignment so it won't count against me). It's kind of hard to hate him now. Bastard.

Classes are officially done. I have one take home exam and two finals. YEAH!!!! But time for a nap, i deserve it.

Here's to you GRE

OMG.

I basically spent $140.00 for a test to tell me i'm an idiot. Really? Did i have to spend that much money. Was it that necessary.

I wouldn't say my mood is completely depressed, sad, or stressed. I kind of a knew after i blanked on the word obviate ( :to anticipate and make unnecessary) that i was in deep shit.

From the annoying little clock located in the upper right hand corner, to the moments of complete daydreaming( i swear i spaced for a solid 5 minutes. My dream involved Javier Bardeem and bob haircut) i knew this was going to reflect poorly on my score. And poorly did it reflect.

My three days of studying and watching America's Next Top Model marathons did not help. Though i could have written a whole essay on the injustices of Heather being kicked off the new season.

I'm going to retake in January which will give me ample to study. Particularly the first or second week before school starts, so i'll be all refreshed from Christmas break. Plus it will give me time to study words like "jejune" and graphs and charts.

I should have sent my scores to Harvard just to give someone a giggle.

My number one school thankfully does not require any GRE scores so now i just have to work on a kickass story and hope that will be enough to get me in.

Gre- 1. Beckett- O, But fighting.

Graduate Exam

I'm taking the GRE on Wednesday. And i have this terrible fear that it may kick my ass.

I've been going over the math section for the past two days.

And there is a reason why i could never be a mathematician.

Clearly.